Super Moon Protocol Read online

  The force that slammed against the house stopped suddenly. Joe waited. In the silence, he headed to the living room to check on his son. Tommy lay on the couch. He screamed as Erma desperately tried to hold him still in order to remove the shards of glass from his feet. Strewn across the coffee table were bandages, gauze, and cotton balls. Blood poured from Tommy’s soles. He was purple, unable to catch his breath as he screamed. Joe’s thigh burned badly, but he pushed the pain aside. It then occurred to him Annie wasn’t in the room.

  “Where is Annie?” Joe asked in a panic.

  “I don’t know! Help me here, dammit!” Erma screamed as Tommy kicked her in the face and splattered it with blood.

  Joe started to go to Tommy and comfort him. The force slammed into the house again. BANG! BANG! BANG! Pictures and decorations flew off the walls. The sheetrock cracked, and a large wall clock fell. It shattered its huge glass face on the floor with a deafening crash.

  “Make it stop, Joe! Please, God, make it stop!” she cried out. She sobbed with Tommy wrapped in her arms, the glass removal effort abandoned.

  Joe had no idea what to do. So far the Colonel hadn’t punched through the walls. The force continued to move along the wall toward the brick chimney. Joe figured if the rooster punched into that, it would for sure break its neck. He shuffled along the wall toward the chimney and screamed at the force, “Come get me, you psycho son of a bitch! Over here!” He coaxed the bird to follow his voice so he would slam into the bricks.

  He laughed like a crazy loon, but it seemed to work. The force from outside followed his voice and moved along the wall as Joe hoped it would. BANG! BANG! BANG!

  “One more time, you bastard,” he said to himself. He anticipated the next whack would be into the bricks. But it never came. All he could hear was Tommy and Erma as they sobbed, wrapped tightly together on the couch. Everyone froze and waited for what seemed like an eternity.

  “Is it gone?” Erma finally whispered, afraid to speak.

  “I don’t know . . . Shhh!” Joe said. He strained to hear outside.

  Suddenly the window on the other side of the chimney exploded in a spray of glass and startled them all. Joe screamed too and covered his head. Sanders had slammed into one of the windows and broken all the glass out. However, the thick solar screen sent him reeling back, like a vertical trampoline. Over and over, the screen extended into the room and denied the rooster, but it was no match for his talons, which were already ripping through. Joe ran and grabbed the poker from the fireplace tools and readied himself. In high school Joe led his team in home runs and RBIs. It’d been a while, but he felt like he could deliver a grand slam tonight.

  Colonel Sanders finally tore through the screen and stuck his head in the hole he created. He cocked his head and trained his remaining, swollen eye on Joe and screamed that brain-piercing scream before he tore through the screen the rest of the way. Joe couldn’t believe how battered the rooster’s head was from being slammed into the sides of the house. The top part of his beak was broken, which left a jagged opening. One of his nasty little eyes was pierced. It oozed a greenish-pink mush. His feathers and skin were torn back from around his head, which gave a grotesque view of thick, sinewy jaw muscles. They were all pulpy and oozy. A huge shard of glass was stuck in the bird’s large chest, but didn’t seem to faze him.

  “Run!” Joe screamed to his wife just as the rooster launched itself at Joe.

  Joe was ready. Many years of practice and training took over as he stepped into his swing. He twisted at his hips, arms extended fully. He never took his eyes off that ball of beaked damnation as it hurled itself at him. In his baseball prime, Joe knew when his swing resulted in a home run just as the ball hit the bat. There was a solid connection. Not a single vibration of the bat in his hands, just that unmistakable crack! He would knowingly drop the bat and start his jog around the bases and watch his moon shot sail over the fence. Fans cheered his name, and his teammates all met him at home plate, where they traded high fives, fist bumps. Lastly, the inevitable slap on the ass from his coach.

  That same satisfying, solid connection happened here as the poker connected with Sanders. It sent chills through Joe’s arms. The room exploded with feathers, and he saw the rooster slam into the chimney bricks with a bloody WHUMP! The bird hit hard then bounced onto the floor. Joe gripped the poker with all his strength and cautiously approached the heap of feathers as it twitched and jerked. Colonel Sanders made wet sucking sounds that blew pink bubbles from his crushed beak. His knurled neck was twisted in a fashion that had to mean it was broken.

  “Please, God, be broken.” Joe silently prayed as he walked toward him, inch by inch.

  As if the rooster sensed Joe’s approach, he quickly cocked his head and looked up at Joe. This sudden movement by the bird caused Joe to shrink back then instinctively lung forward to smack the bird with the poker. He swung the poker down with all his strength. It hit something above his head.

  With all his focus on the heap of feathers on the floor, Joe inched cautiously toward it. He wasn’t aware his position was directly under the 74-inch ceiling fan above. “The Beast,” Joe called it when he saw it on display at the local hardware box store. Erma had to have it. Their vaulted ceiling looked too open and bare with a regular 46-inch fan. The poker barely grazed the huge fan motor when he swung down, but it was enough to deflect his aim. Colonel Sanders was already in flight and flew at Joe with only one operational claw. The other dangled at an odd angle, clearly broken. However, the one that tracked his face was all the rooster needed to put Joe down. Joe instinctively dropped from his feet as one of the fish-hook-shaped talons grazed his head. It opened a nasty gash from his hairline down the side of his temple. The Colonel overshot his mark and slammed into the far wall. Joe took the opportunity and ran down the hall to where his family was.

  “Erma!” Joe shouted as he searched for his family.

  “We’re in your office!” screamed back Erma. Joe rounded the corner and ducked into the office. He slammed the door shut and locked it.

  “Oh my God, Joe! Your head is gushing!” panicked Erma as she ran to him.

  “It’s fine, it’s fine. Where is Annie?” Joe asked, terrified.

  “She’s here, she’s here. She was hiding in your credenza,” Erma explained.

  Joe had no time to register his relief, because suddenly there was a hard crash against the door of the office. Then another and another. Splinters flew into the room. Erma screamed and huddled with the kids in the corner. Joe had to think.

  “We can go out a window and get to my truck. I have the keys in my pocket.”

  But before he could even get to a window a familiar BANG! BANG! BANG! slammed into the house. But it didn’t sound like one basketball as before; it sounded like a whole basketball team! Dozens of forces slammed into the walls and ceiling. The windows exploded into the room. Erma screamed in unison with the terrified kids. Joe considered this was the end. He would let Sanders have him. He would surrender himself and allow the savage beast with his hideous lot of evolutionized cluckers to eat out his eyes and other soft tissues. Like buzzards do to fresh roadkill that litter the highways. Then he pictured Annie and Tommy picked to pieces as chickens fought over their young bodies.

  “No . . . No . . . NOOO!” he screamed.

  As more of the office door disintegrated, an idea popped into Joe’s mind.

  “Get the kids in the credenza! Hurry, shove them in! Now, dammit, move!” he shouted as he grabbed Annie and crammed her into one of the large bottom compartments. He shut its door tight. Erma finally gained some awareness and shoved Tommy into the other one. He was a bit too big, so Joe shoved hard on the door. That earned a loud, painful scream from Tommy. He turned to Erma and quickly told her to get behind the door. She positioned herself so that when the door to the office opened, she would be behind it.

  Joe said, “On the count of three. One . . . two . . . three!” Joe opened the door as Colon
el Sanders barreled into the room. The rooster scratched and clawed for him. Joe quickly sidestepped the bird into the hall. He limped as fast as he could to the foyer to grab his shotgun behind the plant. Blood from his previous entanglement with Colonel Sanders was smeared across the white tiles. This caused him to slip and land hard on the gash in his thigh. He screamed as a flash of hot pain shot up his body. Tears streamed down his face as he gasped for breath. From his office he heard Erma scream in torturous pain. Her anguish pierced his own.

  “Erma!” he yelled back. She continued her screams of utter agony.

  He knew then the solar screens on the office windows had finally failed. God knows what version of hell was streamed into his office and ripped his wife apart. Joe pushed himself up and grabbed his shotgun. He racked the slide, which loaded one of the buckshot shells into the breach. He struggled back to his office. When he turned the corner of the hall a demonized hen came at him. Its claws turned up toward him and drove deep into his gaped thigh. The pain was unbearable, and Joe thought he might pass out. Another scream erupted from his wife. This snapped him back from the darkness. He grabbed the feathered freak by the neck, ignored its serrated beak that dug into his wrist, and swung it around several times until its head popped off. Its bloody body splattered against the ceiling and fell to the floor. It flopped around like a fish out of water.

  Joe turned into the office, gun raised. What he saw, he couldn’t believe. It caused him to lower the weapon. Dozens of demon chickens poured in through the windows. Erma was on the floor motionless. Several chickens gouged chunks of meat from her back and legs. Triumphantly, balanced on one leg atop Erma’s head, was Colonel Sanders.

  He cocked his head to the side seemingly to tell Joe, “You took mine, and I now have taken yours.”

  With a piercing scream the rooster leaped into the air. Joe never had a chance to raise the shotgun. The pendulum of luck had made its way back in Joe’s direction, however. From the hip he angled the barrel up and pulled the trigger. The sound was deafening in the small room. All the chickens jumped up and bounced off the ceiling in comical unison. As the feathers and chaos subsided, a pink mist still hung in the air. Against the far wall directly in front of Joe was a splatter of gore mixed with white and black feathers. He expected an onslaught of pissy hens, so he racked the slide of the Benelli to load another round. Instead, the chickens seemed suddenly normal. They clucked and ran into each other, confused in the chaos. The rooster’s death must have broken whatever hoodoo they were under. Erma lay on the floor. She bled badly. Her clothes were shredded, and some fingers were ripped off her hands. The birds had taken chunks from all over her body. Even patches of her scalp.

  Joe kneeled down and prayed, “Please be alive . . . please.”

  Erma stirred and looked up at Joe.

  “The kids, Joe. Save the kids,” she whispered before she fainted.

  Joe quickly opened the two doors of the credenza. His kids spilled out onto the floor. He swept them up and shielded their eyes. He quickly took them to the next bedroom. Back in his office he grabbed the phone. He went to call 911, when he saw it: the rooster’s severed head lay there on the floor.

  With the rest of its body implanted into the wall, the severed head looked up at him. It cocked sideways in that robotic herky-jerky way. Colonel Sanders sized him up with his only little, beady eye. All of the evening’s events raged inside of Joe. He lost his dog, his home was destroyed, his son lay in the next room with deep slices in his feet, and now his one-and-only love lay on the floor mangled, holding on to the last shreds of her life. Joe positioned the barrel of the shotgun so Colonel Sanders stared into its long cold barrel.

  Then through gritted teeth, eyes narrowed and glowing like scorched embers that roared to life, he hissed, “Deep fry in hell.”

  Then pulled the trigger.

  Chapter Three

  Dallas, Texas, 2020

  The Aftermath

  Fifty Years Later

  “Last call, buddy. Hey, fella? Last call.” Rob looked up to see the bartender offering him a refill as the clock struck midnight. “No thanks,” he replied, bringing his attention back to the warm, half-empty glass of beer that sat in front of him.

  “If all my customers drank like you, my kids would be in the streets,” the bartender muttered as he moved on to wipe the bar further down.

  Rob was in his own world and didn’t hear. His attention was on the last of the carbonated bubbles that freed themselves from the sides and bottom of his beer glass. One by one, they raced to the top as if fleeing the oppression of the heavy, amber liquid, then burst into the open air excited for their freedom and the happiness of their new life.

  For the last two hours, these bubbles represented various friends and acquaintances Rob had grown up with and how eventually they all seemed to move on, starting careers and families. Their dreams fulfilled and being . . . happy. One solitary bubble clung to the bottom of the flat beer that remained. Unable to break free, it just sat there waiting to be consumed. Rob felt this last bubble was him here and now, with just one year left to finish his degree in journalism. On the bar next to him lay a letter that informed him he failed to finish his academic probation satisfactorily and the dean rescinded Rob’s scholarship. Without a scholarship, there was no way he could afford to finish at this university or potentially any university.

  Being put on academic probation wasn’t due to Rob’s inability to perform in his studies. In fact, he made the dean’s list his first two years and earned a coveted spot as an editor for the university’s newspaper, which was mostly reserved for upperclassmen. Writing was Rob’s passion since he first learned to string a sentence together. It was his escape from the turmoil of his childhood. His father was committed to a mental hospital when Rob was ten years old, and shortly after, his mother dropped him and his younger sister, Mel, off with a neighbor. She was supposed to return in an hour after she ran errands. She never did. From that point on it was one foster family after another for him and Mel. Rob kept a journal at an early age and wrote creative stories as an escape from all the instability. Mel, just two years younger, was less fazed from all the drama and easily found friends, but not always the kind normal parents would approve of.

  Foster parents would take them in with the promise of a loving family. Soon they would find Rob frustrating because he was not sociable and withdrew from attention, while Mel created attention wherever she could. This often left her in trouble with teachers and ultimately, the law. Once the newness of the brother-sister combo wore off, they would be cast away only to be dropped into another dysfunctional foster family that made the same fake promises. The degrees of dysfunctionality in these families were a crapshoot. Either the parents were neglectful or overbearing, or the siblings were awful to them or ignored them all together.

  Making friends was virtually impossible. Rob had learned to read people very quickly to know if they could be trusted or not. He honed this skill to survive. Within mere seconds of being in the presence of a person, he would turn into a chameleon hoping to minimize attention to himself. Feeling he was part of the wallpaper, he would observe, watch and listen. He made mental notes he would later use to create characters in his stories.

  One summer he met a neighbor kid, Josh, with whom Rob hoped a full-fledged friendship would flourish.

  Josh was an only child that regularly used what Rob vaguely remembers his mother referring to as “questionable language.” He seemed to have everything a kid could want. He had video games, nice new clothes, and a really cool bike—unlike Rob, who never had two pennies to rub together and rarely had anything new. Him having video games would be as ridiculous a concept as him having a Ferrari.

  When Josh asked Rob what he liked to do for fun, Rob replied, “I like to write stories.”

  Josh looked puzzled and retorted, “What the hell is that? Sounds like boring crap girls do.” After Rob explained how he could create wild adventures using ch
aracters created any way he wanted, Josh seemed intrigued as if using his brain for a source of entertainment was a newly discovered concept. “So like, all the chicks can have huge knockers, and I can be all famous and rich?” Josh asked excitedly as he came around to the idea more and more.

  “Sure, I guess. That’s what’s so much fun about it. You can be anybody and be anywhere you want,” replied Rob.

  They began a creative writing project together in which one would write a few pages in a spiral notebook then hand it off to the other. This back-and-forth method allowed each writer to inject their own style and imagination into the story. When they started it seemed like a good idea, but soon they found themselves locked in arguments about why the other took the story in this direction or that. And frankly, Rob grew tired of all the huge knockers, as it seemed Josh’s parts of the story centered around them.

  In the story he and Josh had built a spaceship that took them far into space. They entered a new galaxy and found a planet on which, per the ship’s computer, the atmosphere could support life. They landed and readied themselves with an arsenal of weapons and high-tech gadgetry. They exited the craft ready to destroy any foe. These were the parts Rob loved writing the most. The creative invention of weapons and gadgets, then going to battle. Instead, they were greeted by large-breasted green babes in revealing clothes that instead of walking, hopped everywhere.

  When Rob asked Josh why they hopped instead of walked, he responded, “Really? Are you a dumbass? No, you must be a gay dumbass if I have to explain that to you.”